From your description, it is likely that none of the things you did 
caused any further harm.

Cookies can be either helpful or harmful. The helpful kind remember 
useful information on sites you visit so that future visits are easier 
on you. Harmful kinds can track and report on your use of the computer 
in a non beneficial manner OR do other sneaky things. So deleting them 
all is a mixed bag but not harmful.

With a broadband connection, the temporary Internet files are also not 
critical and should be deleted every now and then. They are the files 
that make up the web pages you visit. Rather than having to download 
these files every time you visit the same web page, only newer files are 
downloaded. For a dial up connection this speeds up the process of 
opening revisited web pages. For broadband it helps but is not critical.

Performing a registry cleaning every so often is not bad and will help 
peak performance. The program you used receives good reports, but since 
I do not use that one, I can't comment on removing the remaining issues 
it identified. I would leave them for now until I became confident of 
the program.

Mozilla Firefox is a good browser. I use it instead of Internet Explorer.

Google Earth is cute but Microsoft has a much better aerial viewing 
program. I do not understand why the person had you download and install 
it for the problem you were having.

Norton and McAfee are OK as anti virus programs. When your subscription 
is nearly up give AVG a try. It is free and I have found it to be a very 
good anti virus program. Activating real time protection and doing 
occasional scans are important.

Lavasoft (Ad- Aware) is a good anti spyware program when use in 
conjunction with Spybot Search & Destroy, Spyware Blaster, and Windows 
Defender. Ad-Aware (free edition) is used for scanning. Spybot is used 
for real time protection and scanning. Spyware Blaster is used for real 
time protection. Windows Defender is used for real time protection and 
scanning. These will keep away almost all of the bad cookies and other 
items other than virus type infections. However, you have to keep them 
updated.

It is OK to use Firefox instead of Internet Explorer. From your 
description I can not pinpoint the problem with Internet Explorer. You 
could use the Restore function to go back before the problem started, 
however you have added a few programs and a Restore could adversely 
affect them. I would first try a repair of Internet Explorer. Go to 
control panel/add remove programs/ and click on Microsoft Internet 
Explorer. You will get an option to "repair". Try that.

I hope this helps.

Tom Mayer

Lewis c Emerson wrote:
> Last evening while trying to upload to Walgreens a few photos from my
> camera memory card I ran into a severe problem.  After getting one error
> after another requiring me to "sign in" all over again, I called their
> toll-free help line and with the assistance of a young lady I'm afraid
> that I have dug myself into a deep hole. The computer is a one-year old
> laptop with an AMD Sempron processor, 512 MB memory, and running Windows
> XP Pro.  The browser is IE, version 6.   
>
> Up until last night I've had no problems of any kind.  The kind lady
> first had me go to IE tools, then Internet Options and delete the
> cookies.  When this didn't fix the problem she then had me delete the
> Temporary Internet Files.  This didn't help either.  Then she directed me
> to the website www.lavasoft.com and had me download and run all manner of
> stuff.  The first was a Registry Cleaner (I don't understand the
> registry, so just took her advice)  "It" found 72 "objects and asked if I
> wanted "fix" it.  She advised "Yes", but it "fixed" only 20 of the 72 and
> recommended upgrading to another version to fix the remaining 52 objects.
>  She said "not now", so we proceeded to download another EIGHT things - I
> don't know them all, but there are associated with "Googelupdates" and
> included Mozilla Foxfire, Google Earth, Norton Anti Virus, Lavasoft SE
> Personal Edition, plus several more.  I have a high speed broadband
> connection so this didn't take a lot of time, but the resulting scanning
> did.  This still didn't fix the problem, so she had me use the Foxfire
> browser to upload the photos and that worked OK.  By the way, Norton A-V
> would not install as it was recognized that the computer already had
> McAfee A-V installed.
>
> Now, Internet Explorer will not work.  When I try to run  it I get the
> message "In trying to load Internet Explorer has encountered a problem
> with an add-on and needs to close." and then "The following add-on was
> running when the problem occurred".  (Googletoolbar1.dll)  Then an error
> message is sent to Microsoft (What good will this do?).  This is followed
> by another error message "IE has encountered a problem and needs to
> close.  We are sorry for the inconvenience and you may lose data, etc.
> etc."
>
> Now, I don't understand Add-ons, Registry, and much, much more so I'm at
> a loss as to where to turn.  I'd like to get my IE back again.  In less
> that 24 hours I've gone from having a well-working computer to one that's
> really sick.  Can the remaining 52 "objects" in the Registry the problem?
>  Can I go back to Lavasoft and "fix' another 20?  Then another 20, etc?
>
> I'd sure appreciate any and all help, but be gentle as possible as I'm
> not far beyond the novice stage.
>
> Lewis Emerson
>
>
>         The NOSPIN Group has added a new feature on our website,
>            web based bulletinboard for questions and answers:
>               Visit our sister website at http://nospin.com
>
>
>   

        The NOSPIN Group has added a new feature on our website,
           web based bulletinboard for questions and answers:
              Visit our sister website at http://nospin.com